1st American with swine flu dies

Wednesday

May 6, 2009 at 2:00 AM

McALLEN, Texas — Texas health officials on Tuesday announced the first death of a U.S. resident with swine flu, and said she was a 33-year-old schoolteacher who had recently given birth to a healthy baby.

The Associated Press

McALLEN, Texas — Texas health officials on Tuesday announced the first death of a U.S. resident with swine flu, and said she was a 33-year-old schoolteacher who had recently given birth to a healthy baby.

The woman died early Tuesday. She had been hospitalized since April 19, said Leonel Lopez, Cameron County epidemiologist.

Health officials stopped short of saying that swine flu caused the woman's death. State health department spokeswoman Carrie Williams said the woman had "chronic underlying health conditions" but wouldn't give any more details.

Lopez said the flu exacerbated the woman's condition. "The swine flu is very benign by itself," Lopez said. But "by the time she came to see us it was already too late."

The only other swine flu death in the U.S. was of a Mexico City boy who also had underlying health problems and had been visiting relatives in Brownsville, near Harlingen. He died last week at a Houston children's hospital.

There have been 26 other confirmed swine flu deaths, all in Mexico. Hundreds of cases of the disease have been confirmed in several countries, but mostly in Mexico and the U.S.

The teacher was from Harlingen, a city of about 63,000 near the U.S.-Mexico border.

Mexico emerged from its swine flu isolation Tuesday as thousands of newspaper vendors, salesmen hawking trinkets and even panhandlers dropped their protective masks and joined the familiar din of traffic horns and blaring music on the streets of the capital.

Across Mexico, people were eagerly anticipating this week's reopening of businesses, restaurants, schools and parks after a claustrophobic five-day furlough.

"We have a lot of confidence nothing is going to happen," said Irineo Moreno Gonzales, 54, a security guard who on Tuesday limited takeout customers to four at a time at a usually crowded downtown Starbucks. "Mexicans have the same spirit we've always had."